Mortgage real-estate investment trusts faced a volatile few months on Wall Street, prompting Sandler O’Neill analysts to downgrade American Capital Agency (AGNC) and ARMOUR Residential REIT (ARR) to sell from hold. Analysts Christopher Donat and Robert Haderer had this to say about the changes:
“While stock prices and book values per share of both companies have been adversely affected by bond market activity in early 2013, we believe that the stock prices do not fully reflect the current risks to the agency mortgage REIT model.”